It was a classic circus, as much of fairy tale election as one might
expect from oligarchical fascists backed by the most murderous empire
in human history. Burning down offices of opposition parties, outlawing
them, shooting, torturing and killing opponents... mobilizing the
military power of the state to conduct a massive terror campaign
against nearly half the country, not to mention the only candidate who
might appeal to the disaffected southeast of the country; Oleg Tsarov,
beaten to a pulp by a fascist mob while police watched and did nothing
– who later has his house burned down by more fascists, the list goes
on.

On election day neatly stacked blocks of ballots appeared at the bottom
of lucite ballot boxes, and the pre-determined and US chosen winner was
duly announced from election commissions guarded by Right Sector thugs.

Within a couple hours of voting, miracle working counters tallied
millions of paper ballots and announced – ta da – a 55% or 57% victory
for billionaire oligarch and chocolate magnate – dubbed Willy Wonka by
cynical Ukrainians, thereby equally miraculously circumventing the need
for a messy second round.

A Czech source quoted at 17.52% turnout – the junta claimed, at one
point, 38%. No matter. As one friend in Kharkov exclaimed in
frustration,

“I wouldn’t look for too much accuracy or accountability in numbers. Fascists don’t know or care. That’s how fascism works.”

The western press will collude in rubber stamping this fiction, and the
Kiev regime’s legitimacy will be further tarnished everywhere but
inside the echo chamber. A. larger question lays bare the absurdity of
this process: after a “revolution,” isn’t it a logical first step to
agree on a new governing framework – a constitution, a basic law to
replace the order the people have supposedly rejected. In this sense,
exactly what office is Willy Wonka assuming. Over what, exactly, is he
presumed to “preside?” The answer, of course, is that he is merely the
new face of oligarchic rule in Ukraine, hand-pre-picked by the US to
have a fig leaf to cover the devolving train wreck that is their
disastrous and reckless policy in the country.”

The real news, of course, is what happens now. Willy Wonka made some
incredible promises during his ‘campaign,’ which, if he meant them
seriously, are incredibly alarming. Apparently the real mistake made by
the junta was that they were too cheap. Poroshenko pledges to correct
this error by drastically raising the pay for those he still expects to
send to murder their brothers in the east. Not, of course, the
thousands of regular army, special forces and local police who have
refused to do so. He probably means selected fascist mercenaries who
will ‘do it right,’ and do not need to be summarily executed for
disobeying orders to engage in ethnic cleansing.

Perhaps even more alarmingly, one of his first declarations after the
“elections” was that his first visit will be to Donbass, or Novorossiya
in the restive east, and even that he intends to hold his
infraudulation ceremony there as the new face of oligarchic control.
Nothing could be more of a provocation and a declaration of war against
the people of the east. In order to hold an ‘orderly’ inauguration, the
east would have to be ‘pacified.’ This is as clear a signal as any that
there can be no negotiating, no reconciliation, no recognition of the
legitimate aspirations of almost half the country. It is an aggressive
declaration that the only way forward will be military confrontation.
This man is a dangerous fascist, like all oligarchs.

The clear message is that Banderism – Ukrainian ultra nationalism – is
the ongoing state ideology that excludes and vilifies citizens a huge
section of the country. His ‘victory speech’ only added salt to this
endless wound, confirming that he, too, sees citizens resisting the
junta’s authority in the east as ‘terrorists,’ only a step above the
‘insects’ (Colorado beetles) which is the favorite dehumanizing term
used by the Nazis of the Right Sector. He even went so far as to pledge
to “cleanse” these terrorists from streets and towns of the region and
posited himself as a ‘liberator’ of Crimea, whose inhabitants have
shown no desire for such liberation.

These are extremely alarming developments. The US will scream and
bellow that, an election having been held, he will have every right to
take such actions – which by sheer' coincidence dovetail with the US’
own agenda. An elected president’ can quite legitimately (according to
those who accept him as such) order the suppression of rebellion on his
country’s territory. He can have deserters and traitors Shot and
imprisoned, and consolidate and focus military force as he deems fit.
Regular army soldiers have already been summarily executed for refusing
to shell cities and kill civilians, so this is just ratcheting up the
terror. Moreover, he appears quite willing to take advantage of a
‘honeymoon period’ when some confusion will make many people go along
with his legitimacy. This is, to be blunt, some scary shit.

The rhetoric of resistance, which has always been very compelling, was
that the junta had no authority. Troop defections were massive under
this line of reasoning, and have been getting bolder – hence the
summary executions. But Willy Wonka – deemed a ‘legitimate leader –
will appoint ministers, dutifully rubber stamped by the Rada; Russia
will recognize the election while condemning the new government’s
actions, etc. etc. etc. Large numbers of Ukrainians, while still not
wanting their sons to fight, of course, will be fine with paying
thousands of Nazis and psychotic killers to do the work, convincing
themselves that they have now ‘turned a corner’ with peaceful
elections. Russia will still refuse to step in, leaving Donbass to rely
on its ragtag army of self-defenders against an increasingly vicious
and increasingly well-armed (by NATO/CIA) group of fanatics... It is a
complete nightmare...

My fear – I hesitate but will say it openly – is that Putin may have
miscalculated by seeming to play along with this election farce. By
giving hints that he will recognize the winner, he has been party to
what will be an enormous escalation of violence and attacks on Donbass.
He may not like the increasingly class character of those rebellions,
but their fate is also his. While I am not privy to the Russian game
plan, I am certain that they realize that this is a severe existential
threat to the Russian state itself, and has been designed as such. The
west makes no similar mistake in vilifying the Syrian election two
months before they happen. They have * never* wavered for a second in
their promise that they will not only not recognize the results, but
will continue and escalate their bloody and illegal assault on Syrian
sovereignty. Fascists (and the oligarchic capitalists with whom they
are closely aligned) want to *kill* anyone who dares to resist. There
is no deal to be worked out or any rhetorical or political avenue that
isn’t a trap. Not one,

Without wanting to end with a cliffhanger, there is very little except
for the above that is clear at this point. But the reason I rush to
write it is that the information war is emerging as perhaps one of the
most important fronts in the attempt to resist and push back against
this push to globalize IMF austerity using outright fascist allies as
the witting or unwitting shock troops in this campaign. The empire is
angry and threatened by losing any control of the narrative at all, and
is fighting back with a vengeance. Just on the eve of the election
farce in Ukraine, a particularly bold attack destroyed thousands of
files posted on YouTube by Anna-news, an emerging resistance outlet
which has quickly become one of the most popular and reliable sources
of information for those resisting empire in Syria and Ukraine. “We
have learned an important lesson from this: the truth is the means for
victory.”

Many of us who consider ourselves to be part of this information
resistance will redouble our efforts. As a certain philosopher once
said, we have nothing to lose but our chains, and we have a world to
win. Make no mistake, however. While it is also a war of words, and
words are crucial, this is now a hot war, and the forces of evil–at
this moment in the hot spot of Ukraine–have made open military conflict
a necessity and an inevitability. It is a scary and dangerous time.